Obama: America Has ‘Hit a Wall’ With Russia

U.S. President speaks about Syria during a joint news conference with Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt at the Prime Minister’s office in Stockholm, Sept. 4, 2013.

Reuters

President Barack Obama said Wednesday that the U.S. has “hit a wall” in its relationship with Russia, pointing to disagreements over Syria and other issues as roadblocks in his efforts to work with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

At a press conference in Stockholm, Mr. Obama offered a blunt assessment of a relationship that has deteriorated in recent months, but he said he has not written off the possibility that the U.S. and Russia can work together on areas of common interest.

“Do I hold out hope that Mr. Putin may change his position on some of these issues?” Mr. Obama said. “I’m always hopeful, and I will continue to engage him.”

The U.S. president underscored his frustration with Mr. Putin’s support for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime, saying that it has been difficult to convince Russia to acknowledge the terrible behavior of the Syrian leader. The White House has said Mr. Assad used chemical weapons against his own people – an assertion that Mr. Putin has disputed.

Mr. Obama’s comments came ahead of this week’s Group of 20 summit in St. Petersburg, Russia. Mr. Obama had planned to travel to Moscow to meet with Mr. Putin before the summit, but he canceled the trip as divisions over Syria hardened and Russia refused to return National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden to the U.S.

While Mr. Obama said that he would continue to engage Mr. Putin, that doesn’t appear to be on this week’s agenda. The U.S. president has scheduled bilateral meetings in St. Petersburg with leaders from Japan, China and France. A White House official said the U.S. and Russian leaders likely would have a chance to speak on the margins of the summit, but no formal meeting has been scheduled.

In an interview with Russia’s First Channel and the Associated Press, Mr. Putin called the White House’s decision to cancel the trip to Moscow “not a catastrophe.” The Russian president described Mr. Obama as an “interesting interlocutor” who makes his position clear.

Mr. Putin expressed optimism that he and his U.S. counterpart could work together in the future while noting that they sometimes have different objectives and interests.

“President Obama hasn’t been elected by the American people in order to be pleasant to Russia,” Mr. Putin said. “And your humble servant hasn’t been elected by the people of Russian to be pleasant to someone either.”

At the press conference Wednesday, Mr. Obama pointed areas of agreement between the two countries and said the U.S. reset with Russia had yielded progress, citing a new START treaty that reduced nuclear stockpiles and Russia’s membership in the World Trade Organization as examples.

“There were a whole host of outcomes from that reset that were valuable to the United States,” Mr. Obama said.

He said international action would be much more effective in Syria if Russia would cooperate, but so far, Russia has blocked even modest actions by the United Nations Security Council. While Mr. Obama offered some optimism about the future, he sounded a sour note about the current state of relations.